Evelyn: 1 Month Old!!!

Happy 1 Month Evie!! Mommy and Daddy loves you so much!!!

I cannot believe that my baby girl is already 1 month old today!!!! When I was told the 'time flies when you have a baby' I didn't think it'd be THIS FAST!!!!!!  I'm totally feeling indifferent today! Sad that time is going by so fast and that she's growing up so fast....but happy that she's healthy and growing like a normal baby should! 

This past month has taught me a lot...about myself and the people I have in my life.  I am SO blessed...beyond what I had ever known.  I knew I had great people in my life but BOY I didn't realize I had THAT many great people who cared about me.  ALL my friends and family have been so supportive and generous (with their time and gifts) that I cannot even begin to thank them all enough.  I've been getting gifts and visits left, right and centre from almost EVERYONE I know!! 

God has taught me to simply just have faith.  Trusting Him has been a life-long struggle for me since I'm such a control freak but somehow God has put me in positions where I had no other choice but to trust Him and I'm SO grateful for that.  I would seriously go INSANE if I didn't have Him to lean on and depend on. 

Even though I'm so sleep deprived and mentally/physically exhausted, I am having the time of my life!!! I knew life would be different but I didn't know that it would be different THIS way.  It's not that I feel like a lot has changed (even though it has) but I just feel like I've grown as a person so much more.  I'm no longer #1 in my life...my baby girl is.  But at the same time I know that because I love my daughter so much and want the best for her, I need to make sure I take good care of myself too.  Everything I do now really is for HER.  And I wouldn't change it for ANYTHING!!!

Evie at 1 month can...

~Smile...but not on command...just sporadically

~Lift her head up when she's propped up on my shoulder

~Kick her feet and swing her arms randomly

~Turn her head left to right

~Make an'O' with her lips

Can't wait to see what else is in store this coming month!!!

Evelyn's First Photoshoot!!!!!

Guess what I got in the mail this morning?? The rest of Evie's photos from her newborn photoshoot with Wendy J Photography!!!! She was only 6 days old when we had these done and already she's bigger.  They grow up so fast don't they??!! 

Time to brag...just a little ;)

Busy Bee Mommy!

This little sweet pea has been keeping Mommy SUPER busy!!! She's a puke machine I tell ya! TONS of laundry to do and she's now sleeping 3-4 hour chunks at night (YAY!) but that means she's up a lot during the day and wants to be held and played with.  

I'm loving being a stay-at-home-mom even though I'm tired a lot but it's ok...not like I can leave the house during the day anyways.  Still got under 3 weeks to go before I can drive or lift anything heavier than baby again due to my C-Section.  Ed's gone back to work last week so I'm home all day with Evie and Tobey (SO grateful to have a guard dog...would feel scared to be home alone for so long without him keeping watch on what's happening around the house!).   

Evie has already started smiling lots and lifting her head like no tomorrow!! She's super strong and loves to move around during the day.  Can't wait until her 2 month doctor check up to see how much she's grown.  We went back when she was 2 weeks and she had already grown 2 inches since birth and is 6 lbs 9 oz (she was 6 lbs at birth).  I'm sure she's over 7 lbs by now and won't be surprised if she'll hit 25 inches in the next month! She's changing so much already too! My mom says that when Evie's eyes are opened she totally looks like me when I was a baby! I still think she's got Daddy's nose and eyes though!!! 

Her birth announcements have arrived and have been sent out...here's a photo!

The front!

The backside!

Our newborn photographer also just messaged me to say that all our photos are in the mail on their way so I'll hopefully have them by then end of the week!! Can't wait to show them all off!!!!


So many fun first time things happening soon! Evie's going to be 1 month on the 29th and we're having a BBQ to celebrate that (it's a Chinese thing to celebrate a baby's first month...usually a banquet but we're going to be more casual about it and just do a family thing).  We also have a 1 month photoshoot set up first week of June so that will be fun! I will also be doing monthly photos of Evie every month...it'll be so cool to see them all lined up together a year from now!!  Father's Day is also just around the corner and it's Ed's first time celebrating it as a Daddy! I've already started my scheming and I can't wait to post all about it afterwards! It's also MY Daddy's 60th birthday at the end of June and it'll be super special since he's now a grandpa too!Oh and I'm also going to blog about my post-pregnancy body too!


So many fun things coming up to blog about!!!! Stay tuned!!!

My First Mother's Day as a Mommy!

Yesterday was Mother's Day and I got to celebrate it as a mother for the very first time! Evie (we call Evelyn 'Evie' pronounced 'eh-vee') turned 2 weeks old and my Mommy (aka grandma) got her a new Mother's Day dress!!!  We had brunch at my Mommy's house and then we went to my parent's church...the church I grew up at.  Afterwards we had dinner at my Mommy...my siblings cooked while we napped!!! 

It was a pretty relaxing day...food was cooked for me and I got gifts!!! My siblings got me cards (one from them and one from my Tobey) and a spa gift certificate that I CANNOT wait to use in about a month when I'm fully healed from my surgery!!!  My hubby and baby got me a diamond ring...it looks EXACTLY like my wedding band and will go on the other side of my engagement ring! I call it the Evie ring!! It hasn't arrived yet since I'm a size 3.5 but I can't wait to start wearing it....hopefully in about a week!!!!  

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY 

to all my Mommy followers!!!!!! Hope your day was FANTABULOUS like mine was!!!

Me and my Mother's Day gifts!!! The flowers were bought by my hubby
and I for MY Mommy!!!

3 generations....my Mommy, me and my baby girl!

My beautiful baby girl in her very pretty Mother's Day dress!!

Here's a photo of our wedding rings...the top one is my wedding band...which is being
replicated so I can wear it on the other side my of my engagement ring to signify our baby!

I actually started my Mother's Day celebrations the day before...so I kind of had a Mother's Day WEEKEND if you will!! I have these 2 friends (mother-daughter duo) who plan THE best tea parties ever and they planned/hosted one the day before Mother's Day!  It was MUCH needed girl time for me and it was great for all the ladies to get to meet my baby girl too!!!!  

Isn't the set up just LOVELY??

My table with 4 other WONDERFUL ladies!

The Mommy/Grandma hostess meeting my baby girl for the very first time!

The Daughter/New Mommy hostess and her 2 month old baby boy!!

Me and my baby girl....all dressed up in a cupcake outfit with an awesome Tutu!!

Daddy dropped us off and picked us up....family photo-op!

Breastfeeding Woes

*notes this is NOT me and my baby....but this sure looks like her!*

So I want to share with everyone my breastfeeding journey.  Most new mommies will start producing milk 2-3 days after baby is born and will have Colostroum (pre-milk) almost right away. But because I never went into labour or had contractions, my milk did not come in (pre-milk even) until baby was 5 days old.  As a result we had to put her on formula while at the hospital (which was 3 nights).    


Pretty much right after you're settled into your recovery room after you give birth (whatever method you had to go through) the nurse will ask the question 'Are you planning on breast feeding your baby?'.  If your answer is 'No', I imagine that the hospital would provide formula for your baby until you leave to go home.  If you're like me and answered with 'Yes', then they would immediately get you to take your top off and try getting your teeny tiny baby to latch on to your nipples.  I was lucky enough and Evie never had problems latching on (sure she didn't open her mouth super wide the first few times but she eventually caught on with no issues).  I have heard some moms tell me that their babies never latched on...and there are various reasons to explain this.  But I didn't have that problem...luckily.  


My problem was that because I gave birth via C-Section prior to going into labour/having contractions/water breaking...pretty much NOTHING was happening close to being in labour for me when I went into surgery, my pre-milk aka Colostroum and milk didn't come in until the night after we went home from the hospital...which was the end of day 5 of Evie's life.  It was REALLLLY frustrating for me at the hospital and I even had a mini meltdown.  I already didn't have the delivery that I had wanted (I had the complete opposite in fact) but now I wasn't even able to provide my own baby with my own milk.  THAT threw me over the edge.  It was always very important to me to have my baby breastfed because of all the health benefits that came with drinking Mommy's milk vs. formula.  But after 2 days of no pre-milk (no food at all) Evie started crying and crying.  She was starving. On top of all that my nipples were totally bruised and sore from all the dry sucking she was doing and I think she sucked more aggressive because she was so hungry and nothing was coming out.  


I buzzed the nurse in after Evie cried non-stop for a few hours and told her that this was not ok because she has had nothing to eat since pretty much 24 hours before my surgery since I had to fast too.  I told the nurse that I wanted her on formula right away.  The nurse also brought in a breast pump for me to use to stimulate the milk to come in rather than having her suck on them since it had become so painful.  I pumped every 3 hours for the remainder of my stay at the hospital and there was not a drip of anything that ever came out.  Evie stayed on formula and when we got home Ed went out to buy more right away. 


I was pretty discouraged at this point and thought that perhaps my milk would never come in because that CAN happen to moms who delivered under my circumstances.  We had bought a breast pump to keep stimulating the milk to come in and I just kept trying hoping something will fill the little 5 ounce bottle it came with....nothing. The second night we were home, we went to my mom's house for dinner (she lives a short 8 minutes drive from our house!) and by the end of dinnertime my breasts were completely sore and stinging and were fully engorged!!  By midnight there was Colostroum coming out and I was able to start pumping a good 1 ounce of pre-milk for my baby! 


We're now almost done weaning Evie off formula (we bought a case of it so we're not going to waste it....), using it only to top off if she seems like she still wants more after her feedings.  I still couldn't put her on my breasts even after the Colostroum came in because my nipples were still sore so I just pumped my milk and bottle fed her since she was used to the bottle.  The times I did try she still latched on but would tire very quickly because she wasn't having to work so hard for her milk.  For a good 5 days we continued the pumping/bottle feeding routine.  I also liked the fact that I could monitor how much she was eating to because we needed to get her weight up since she missed out on a few days of feeds.  


It wasn't only until the last couple of days that I started putting her on my breasts again and only at night because it's so much easier to just change her diaper and put her on me rather than pumping first.  I'm hoping in the next week I'll be more accustomed to physically breast feeding her and using the pump less.  Ed is going back to work after the weekend and that means he'll need to sleep at night and I'll have to start trying to do everything at night myself.  Luckily, Evie has started sleeping through the night on her own.  She's feeding VERY well during the day (an ounce more on average compared to her night time feedings) and she only wakes up once (maybe twice) at night asking for a diaper change/food.  I think sleep training her will be easier later on!  She's such a good baby!!!! 

Here's my little Evie on her bottle drinking Mommy's milk!! YUM YUM!!